They sat together in the rented room of the small inn. Raecci knelt near the door, his usual calm demeanor flitting up against his Will. He had found himself doing that a lot, moving right up to embracing the Way without actually doing so. It was a strange thing and it lent him a sense of peace and contentment he knew of no way to explain or justify. As he relaxed, kneeling against the wall, he began to feel a curious tingle that he could not explain any more than he could explain the state of relaxation. Only partially paying attention to the others in the room, he set about trying to figure it out.

Thelon stood on the opposite side of the door, leaning against the wall with his arms crossed over his massive chest. His enormous axe also leaned against the wall, within easy reach. The big man, who had brought Raecci and Rademon into the mystery of the Temple of Swords, now silently watched the others in the room. Tonight, Thelon's hair was tied back with a woven leather headband, giving him an authoritative look that the others seemed to not notice.

Two people Raecci didn't know sat on chairs part of the way around the room from Thelon. The chairs were stationed on either side of a small table with a keyed drawer. A tiered candelabra shone from the table, adding to light from a fireplace. The first of the two was a tall, gangly human with unkempt brown hair and a stubble of unshaven growth on his chin and jowls. The fellow was narrow from crown to feet, looking as though someone had taken a normal person and stretched him out about a foot, with the man shrinking in width like a piece of dough or putty. This man was dressed in woodsman's leathers, strangely enough, and looked more appropriately placed in some mythical forest from an Athasian legend.

The second of the two unfamilar people was a very small, delicate-looking woman wearinga simple, cotton dress, with rather plain leather shoes and no jewelry. Her rich gold-brown hair was tied tightly behind her head and her skin shone with a light tan, as though even in the dark, moody setting of Sigil, the sun shone down on her. Her eyes were a brilliant green, however. they were the only thing in the entire room that came close to threatening Raecci's serenity. Somehow, the way her eyes reflected the light made it look as though her soul were pouring out of those emerald orbs, catching his attention and jerking it like a child tugging at his finger. She was at least partially elven, he decided, but, as he had noticed on more than one occasion, the elves of Sigil and other lands of the planes were a bit different from the elves he had known on his home world.

Monesa sat in the window sill, her hair lifting around her in un-felt breezes, as if some invisible puppeteer loomed over her, pulling at her hair with strings. Her face was mellow, melancholly, and it looked to Raecci as if she just wished that someone would hug her tightly for a while. Raecci remembered being drawn to her in the tavern and then again in Bloodgem Park, where he had gotten his first real indication of the nature of the Temple of Swords. He still felt attracted to her, despite the heavier garments she now wore and how poorly she was reacting to the heat. Raecci almost smirked at that notion, though. To him it still seemed rather cold.

The last member of the little group sat in a corner against the wall near Monesa's window. The fiend was a cambion Tanar'ri, as Raecci had learned, and his name was Cowlin. The demon always wore black, which seemed suitable to Raecci, and was armed with matching swords on either hip. The swords were shorter than many of the weapons Raecci had seen in Sigil, but they were still as long as his arm. Aside from his inhuman, unnatural presence, Cowlin had a predatorial sense of danger about him, a feeling that even Raecci found a trifle nerve-wracking. Cowlin sat on the floor, his head back against the wall, and yet he still managed to appear menacing and prepared for violence.

Their wait ended when Rademon stepped into the room, dressed in dark greys and blacks. He shut the door behind him, latching it, then faced the group. Without preamble, he glared at Monesa.

"Get down out of that window."

She looked back at him, her eyes startled, and she sat up straight.

"It's about time you showed up," Monesa snarled back at him. "We've got work to do and we keep having to wait on this excellent spy network that has as of yet failed to reveal anything at all."

Rademon's brows raised. It was clear that her comment angered him but instead of reacting with hostility, he repeated his earlier statement. "Please, get down out of the window. Close the shutters and the curtains too. We're being stalked."

Monesa stood, hands on her hips, glaring at the fellow. Her hair almost jerked around her head, the unseen breeze becoming a violent wind. "Just what exactly is it that you do again?" She glanced at Thelon. "Where did you get this guy again?"

Before Thelon could answer, Cowlin lifted his head from against the wall. "He's an assassin."

Everyone, Raecci included, stared with surprise at the cloaked Tanar'ri. Rademon watched the fiend with something that resembled hostility but, as with Monesa's arguements, the man kept his temper under rigid control. Running a hand through his thick hair in a nervous gesture, Rademon met the faces of the others in the room. When he looked back at the cambion, his voice was calm and even.

"How do you know about that?"

Cowlin shrugged. "Maybe it's the stilletto in your vest. Or, perhaps its the brace of darts on your back. Then again..."

Rademon cut him off. "It doesn't matter. We don't have time to worry about that now. The lot of us are marked." He looked at Monesa. "If you wish to live, do as I say and step away from that window. Who knows how many crossbows are waiting out there."

Monesa, who had been watching Rademon with some suspicion, suddenly glanced at the window, her eyes wide and cautious. Cowlin rose from his corner, braced the shutters and pulled the drapes. When he was finished, Thelon cleared his throat.

"So what is it that brings you to suspect that we're all in danger of sudden assassination," the big warrior asked.

"Because. I've been trained to know when people are aiming for me. I know what to look for because I do the same things myself. And...this wouldn't be the first time this has happened to me. However, it's in relation to the temple. That means that the rest of you are in danger too."

Thelon uncrossed his arms. "Who is the culprit behind this?"

"You aren't going to like this," Rademon said. "It's Factol Skall."

"How do you know that," Monesa queried.

Rademon shrugged. "The Dustmen are the only ones posting rewards."

"Have you any idea who's taken the jobs," Cowlin asked, returning to his corner, where he once again slid down into a sitting position.

Shaking his head, Rademon moved over to another of the walls, where he put his back against the ragged wallpaper. "If I were that good, we'd no longer be in danger."

Reacci, sitting with his back straight, pulsed with the transition of his thoughts from normal to Way and back to normal. He was more relaxed, he thought, than he had ever been in his life. His mind teetered on extreme awareness, as if by straddling the threshold between conscious thought and the enlightenment of the Way, his senses were amplified and his measure of the passage of time was slowed. He knew a way to tamper with the flow of time around him but this was a different thing altogether. He was not using his Will to empower the change. It merely happened of its own accord, dragging Thelon's words out, making the swaying to Monesa's hair slow to a standstill, the moments passing so slowly that her hair simply hung in the air.

In this brief, sublime respite from the humdrum of his own mind, Reacci finally realized what it was that was bothering him. The sensation he had been feeling throughout the evening was made clear. It was someone else like him. It was another mentalist.

Raecci's ascent to a standing postion seemed almost more like a levitation. He lifted into the air and his legs unfolded beneath him to touch lightly upon the floor. Even as his thoughts returned to normal in a sudden rush of speed, Cowlin also sprang from his sitting position. Raecci remembered Rademon speaking of assassins and how they were all marked. Before he could speak, however, Cowlin drew his blades, shouting a curse in some unknown language.

"Danger," he growled in a voice that pervaded the room. "We are stalked by unseen gith."